BOY WILLIE: I’d come back at night and haul off his whole patch while he was sleep.

WINING BOY: Alright. Now Mr. So and So, he sell the land to you. And he come to you and say, “John, you own the land. It’s all yours now. But them is my berries. And come time to pick them I’m gonna send my boys over. You got the land . . . but them berries, I’m gonna keep them. They mine.” And he go and fix it with the law that them is his berries. Now that’s the difference between the colored man and the white man. The colored man can’t fix nothing with the law.

BOY WILLIE: I don’t go by what the law say. The law’s liable to say anything. I go by if it’s right or not. It don’t matter to me what the law say. I take and look at it for myself.

LYMON: That’s why you gonna end up back down there on the Parchman Farm.

BOY WILLIE: I ain’t thinking about no Parchman Farm. You liable to go back before me.

LYMON: They work you too hard down there. All that weeding and hoeing and chopping down trees. I didn’t like all that.

WINING BOY: You ain’t got to like your job on Parchman. Hey, tell him, Doaker, the only one got to like his job is the waterboy.

DOAKER: If he don’t like his job he need to set that bucket down.

BOY WILLIE: That’s what they told Lymon. They had Lymon on water and everybody got mad at him cause he was lazy.

LYMON: That water was heavy.

BOY WILLIE: They had Lymon down there singing:

(Sings.)

O Lord Berta Berta O Lord gal oh-ah

O Lord Berta Berta O Lord gal well

(LYMON and WINING BOY join in.)

Go ’head marry don’t you wait on me oh-ah

Go ’head marry don’t you wait on me well

Might not want you when I go free oh-ah

Might not want you when I go free well

BOY WILLIE: Come on, Doaker. Doaker know this one.

(As DOAKER joins in the men stamp and clap to keep time. They sing in harmony with great fervor and style.)

O Lord Berta Berta O Lord gal oh-ah

O Lord Berta Berta O Lord gal well

Raise them up higher, let them drop on down oh-ah

Raise them up higher, let them drop on down well

Don’t know the difference when the sun go down oh-ah

Don’t know the difference when the sun go down well

Berta in Meridan and she living at ease oh-ah

Berta in Meridan and she living at ease well

I’m on old Parchman, got to work or leave oh-ah

I’m on old Parchman, got to work or leave well

O Alberta, Berta, O Lord gal oh-ah

O Alberta, Berta, O Lord gal well

When you marry, don’t marry no farming man oh-ah

When you marry, don’t marry no farming man well

Everyday Monday, hoe handle in your hand oh-ah